Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing device and method, and an imaging device, and particularly relates to a technology for generating an image for stereovision, from a two-dimensional image.
Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, as technologies for changing a two-dimensional image into a three-dimensional image, technologies described in PTLs 1, 2 and 3 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2011-164202; Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 07-182533; Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2010-515303) are known.
A stereoscope called a synopter is known as an optical device that displays the same picture to the left and right eyes and utilizes the principle of so-called monocular stereovision. An invention described in PTL 1 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2011-164202) adds a mask to an input image of a two-dimensional image, when displaying a 3D image converted from 2D by utilizing the principle of the monocular stereovision, in order to inhibit the decrease in display quality due to defect regions or invalid regions in the edge portion of a screen.
In a method described in PTL 2 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 07-182533), from a two-dimensional image composed of a background image and a front image including a person image and the like in front of it, the front image is extracted, and the front image is moved in the horizontal direction, depending on the parallax and the perspective. Further, the moved front image is magnified such that a no-image-information region generated by the movement of the front image is compensated, and the front image and the background image are synthesized.
Further, in a method described in PTL 3 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2010-515303), two-dimensional input frames are classified into one of a flat image class and a non-flat image class. A frame in the flat image class is directly converted into a 3D stereo image. A frame classified into the non-flat image class is further processed automatically and adaptively, based on the complexity, so that a depth map is generated. Then, the conversion into a 3D stereo image is performed using the depth map.
Meanwhile, a so-called “miniature photograph generation” technology, in which an ordinarily imaged landscape photograph is processed as if a model was imaged at close range, is known (PTL 4; Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2011-120143). In the ordinarily imaged landscape photograph or the like, a blurring process is performed to the region other than a target region, and thereby, a miniature-like photograph is generated (FIG. 11 and FIG. 12 in PTL 4).
Moreover, a monocular 3D imaging device that, with a phase-difference CCD on which subject images having passed through left-right-directionally different regions of a single image-taking lens are pupil-divided and are formed respectively, performs the photoelectric conversions of the respective subject images having passed through the regions, and acquires a left-eye image and right-eye image (monocular 3D image) having a phase difference from each other depending on the focus deviation amount, is known (PTL 5; Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2011-199502).